Pakistan

Pakistan: population, cities

Population

Population development

According to Countryaah website, the population of Pakistan is estimated at up to 200 million - including the controlled areas of Kashmir. Pakistan is one of the six most populous countries in the world. With an average population density of 188 residents per km², the country has a slightly lower population than Germany.

Meanwhile, the population in the country is distributed very unevenly: three-quarters of the residents who live in the fertile river plains of the Punjab and Sindh are compared to the sparsely populated areas of the dry and high mountain regions in the north and west. The Thar and Balochistans are sometimes even deserted. And only 5% of Pakistani people live in Balochistan. And up to 50% of all residents have settled in the relatively small Punjab.

The population increases by more than 2% annually, making Pakistan one of the highest growth rates in Asia. The birth rate remains at a very high level. But the improvement in preventive healthcare has also led to an increase in life expectancy and consequently in the population. The death rate has decreased.

Ethnic composition

There are many different tribes and ethnic groups in Pakistan. It's about 50% Punjabis; 15% Sindhis; 15% Pashtuns; 8% mohajirs (Muslims who emigrated from India); 5% Baluch and around 1.2 million refugees from Afghanistan.

Religious

affiliation Islam is the state religion in Pakistan with approx. 97%. The majority are Sunnis - around 15% Shiites. There are also about 3% Christians, Hindus and others

National languages The constitutionally established national and lingua franca of most Pakistani people is Urdu, whereby English is the official language (e.g. of the judiciary and administration). Furthermore, around 50 different languages are used in the country. The most important of these are Punjabi, Sindhi, Pashtu, Seraiki and Baluchi. The most widely spoken language in Pakistan is Punjabi. This is stated as their mother tongue by around 40% of the population.

Capital and other cities

The capital of Pakistan is Islamabad, with an estimated population of over 1 million. If you travel to Islamabad, you will quickly realize how strongly modern and traditional meet. The Saudi Pak Tower in particular is an excellent example of this. Some buildings have been Islamized that seemed too modern. In the young city of Islamabad, which can be proud of one of the largest mosques in the world with the Faisal Mosque and has many government buildings (such as the National Assembly, the Supreme Court or Aiwan-e-Sadr, the official residence of the President), is also where most of the foreign embassies and the Shakar Parian Hills are located, which offer grandiose views of buildings such as the National Monument or the Heritage Museum.

The commercial center of the city, which is also rich in universities, is the so-called Blue Area, which stretches along Jinnah Avenue. Another important and well-known structure is the gigantic silver globe, which was established in 2004 to mark Pakistan's hosting of the annual SAARC summit. For some time now, the Pakistani capital has been working feverishly on the completion of the Centaurus, which will soon be the largest construction in the country. By and large, Islamabad is a green city with such a good climate that it was also possible to plant exotic plants. Rich flora and fauna can also be found in the north of the Margalla hills, close to the citythat have been transformed into a national park. And if you look around west of Islamabad, you will find the ruins of the city of Taxila, which dates back to the 6th century BC and has strong Buddhist influences.

A detailed description of Islamabad can be found at Goruma here >>>

Karachi

Karachi is a veritable giant. The largest city in Pakistan and the second largest city in the world acts as the capital of Sindh Province and was the country's capital until 1959. Karachi spreads out where the Indus flows as a delta into the Arabian Sea. It is estimated that around 20 million live in the city, making it an octopus-like urban chaos that never stands still. Karachi is the economic, trade and production center of Pakistan as well as a transport hub and cultural center. Several renowned research institutions as well as museums, galleries, sights and the largest port in the country are outstanding characteristics of a city that appears threatening to many (and not entirely without good reason).

An accurate representation of Karachi can be found at Goruma here >>>

Lahore

"Lahore, Lahore aye" - "Lahore is Lahore." With these simple words, the Lahori underscore the chaotic hodgepodge uniqueness of their lively, lovable and invigorating city with justified pride. Lahore, the old and second largest city after Karachi in the actually still young state of Pakistan, is a motley, personable, not always easy to understand, but pleasantly wild mixture of colors, shapes, transfigurations, historical kicks, culture, lust for life and many others People. You can find a detailed representation of Lahore at Goruma here >>>

Faisalabad

The former Lyallpur is Pakistan's third largest city and is inhabited by about 2 million people. The city spreads west of Lahore and belongs to the Punjab province. Faisalbad is an important industrial center (including textile factories and rice) and an important traffic junction.

Peshawar

The "city on the border" functions as the capital of the Pakistani province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. About 3,055,000 people live in the city located near the Afghan border, which for many travelers has a mysterious and mysterious reputation. Peshawar spreads out at the eastern exit of the Chaiber Pass and serves as a simple border crossing between Pakistan and war-torn Afghanistan.

Quetta

Quetta is a tough and simple border and the capital of the province of Balochistan. Around 900,000 people live in crisis-ridden Quetta near the Afghan border. The city is an important military base and the third important center of the Pashtuns. It is also an important hub for the supply of Western troops in Afghanistan who are stationed in connection with the war in Afghanistan and for Operation Enduring Freedom.

Other important and large cities in Pakistan are:

Gujranwala with around 1.7 million residents

Multan with around 1.3 million residents

Rawalpindi with around 1.4 million residents

Hyderabad with around 1.1 million residents

Pakistan: geography, map

Defined by DigoPaul, Pakistan is located in the southern part of Central Asia. It borders in the southwest on the Arabian Sea, in the north on the Central Asian high mountains. The total length of Pakistan's borders is around 6,774 km. Pakistan shares a border with the following four countries:

- Afghanistan with a length of around 2,430 km,

- China with a length of around 523 km,

- India with a length of around 2,912 km and

- Iran with a length of around 909 km.

Pakistan has a little more than 1,000 km of coastline on the Arabian Sea in the south of the country.

Pakistan covers an area of 800,000 km². Thereof:

• Desert

  The Thar stone, scree and sand desert covers approximately 259,000 km ^² (32.3%). The Kharan Desert is another desert of Pakistan.

• Arable land and fields

  Around 26% of the land is used as arable land or fields, especially for growing cotton, rice and wheat.

• Meadows and pastureland

  Around 6% of the land is used as meadows or pastureland.

• Forest

  Around 4% of the country is forested.

• Mountains

  The western Himalayas are located in the north of Pakistan.

  The Karakoram, Pamir and Hindu Kush mountains form natural borders with Pakistan's neighboring countries.

  The Karakoram Mountains have the longest glaciers outside of the polar regions.

Longitude and latitude

Pakistan extends over the following geographical latitude (abbreviation Δφ) and geographical longitude (abbreviation Δλ):

You can find detailed information on this subject under Longitude and Latitude.

Legal time

For Pakistan, the following value applies to Central European Time (CET), i.e. the time without summer time. A minus sign means that it is earlier there, a plus sign that it is later than CET:

Further and detailed explanations of the time can be found under Time zones, time.

The highest point of the sun in Karachi

Karachi, the largest city in the country, lies at a north latitude of around φ = 25 ° (exactly: 24 ° 52 ').

If the sun or its image point is at the northern tropic, i.e. at δ = 23.5 °, summer begins in Karachi, this is June 21. Then, for the highest position of the sun at noon, according to Eq. 1 (see position of the sun):

25 ° = (90 ° - h) + 23.5 °

so:

At 88.5 °, the sun in Karachi has the highest level of the entire year above the horizon (more precisely: above the horizon).

Mountains

K2

The highest mountain in the country is the K2 with a height of 8,611 m.

Other eight-thousanders are:

Cholistan desert

The Cholistan is a desert and semi-desert area in Pakistan in the Pakistani Panschab. The desert is a sandy desert with shifting dunes. In the southeast of Pakistan it passes into the Indian Thar desert.

Both desert areas together cover an area of around 275,000 km².

Rivers

Indus

The longest river in the country is the Indus with a length of around 2,900 km.

Other rivers in the country are the Indus tributaries:

Sutlej, Beas, Ravi, Chenab and Jhelum, which all flow into the Indus and give the "five-stream country", the Punjab, its name.

Lakes

Attabad Lake

Attabad Lake - also known as Gojal Lake - is special in that it was created on January 4, 2010 as a result of a landslide and dammed the Hunza River. The dam formed by the landslide is about 12 km upstream from the city of Karimabad. The lake is around 25 km long and has a water volume of around 500 million m³. It is located in the 72,495 km² special territory Gilgit-Baltistan in the far north of the country.

Hâmûn-i Mâshkel

The largest lake in Pakistan is the Hâmûn-i Mâshkel. It is 85 km long and 35 km wide.

Salt Marsh Rann von Kachchh

The salt marsh "Rann von Kachchh" is located on the southern part of the border between Pakistan, with the largest part belonging to India and only a smaller part in Pakistan in the province of Sindh. The word "Rann" comes from Hindi and means salt swamp when translated. The marshland covers an area of around 28,000 km². The region used to be a bay of the Arabian Sea, but it was separated from the sea by an uplift of the sea floor and gradually became a salt marsh due to the lack of drainage. During the rainy season from July to September, the salt lake is flooded up to 0.5 m. During this time, some rivers carry enough water with which they then flow into the swamp area. The only constant influx - also during the dry season - is the Luni.

Arabian Sea

In the south, Pakistan borders on the Arabian Sea for a length of 1,000 km.

The Arabian Sea is part of the Indian Ocean. It lies between the Arabian Peninsula and India. In the northwest it merges into the Gulf of Oman. In addition to Pakistan, there are also India, Iran and Oman on the Arabian Sea. The well-known cities on this sea are Karachi in Pakistan and Mumbai (Bombay) in India. The salt content of the Arabian Sea is around 3.48%.